Moscow audiences to watch unique ISS film

The first 3-D film, which was shot aboard the International Space Station (ISS) with the help of IMAX technology, will be shown here today for the first time, as Russia celebrates Cosmonautics Day.

The "3-D Space Station" film shows Russia's Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan, the Cape Canaveral space center in Florida and the ISS itself. This film contains EVA (Extra-Vehicular Activity) footage, as well as that showing US space-shuttle lift-offs, flights and docking sequences. All this was disclosed to RIA Novosti by Sergei Puzanov, NASA's public-relations coordinator in Russia.

In his words, special IMAX 3-D "space cameras" featuring particularly sophisticated lens were used to shoot ISS footage and space-walk footage. IMAX analogue systems use 60-mm-plus film, which is almost two times wider than conventional, 35-mm film, and which is used to create crystal-clear images on screens bigger than a three-storey house. The Dolby-Surround sound system makes any film completely realistic.

The film crew specially thanked Russian cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev, who learned to handle the camera in zero-gravity conditions so well that he was even compared to a ballet dancer, Puzanov noted. Krikalev received additional training as cameraman in order to master this camera completely.

The film's US version was dubbed by Tom Cruise, who visited the world-famous Stellar Town just outside Moscow in order to make some episodes more authentic. Meanwhile popular actor Sergei Bezrukov dubbed the Russian version.